Biosecurity and Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Legislation Amendment Bill

I will take a brief call on the commencement date and also to concur with a comment made earlier by the Minister about the urgency for this legislation. I thank the Minister for, having now received the report back from the Primary Production Committee, being prepared to move the bill through the House as quickly as possible.

There was urgency around this legislation. I think it would be fair to say that the select committee remained to be convinced of its urgency as we started the deliberation, but then when we saw a letter from Crown Law that quite categorically told the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry that it should not issue any new import health standards nor should it amend any other import health standards, there was clearly a situation whereby trade at our borders was being slowed quite considerably or halted. That required very urgent action by the Minister, and I congratulate him on doing that.

I shall give the Committee an example. New Zealand has had a regular trade of horses with Australia that has existed for many, many years. During the latter part of last year, Australia had a serious outbreak of equine influenza that caused the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry to act quite quickly and correctly to stop the further importation of horses from Australia. To move from that situation required an amendment to a well-established import health standard.

It would have been the ministry’s intention to move that amendment through, to have an amended import health standard, and to allow the recommencement of the equine trade between Australia and New Zealand, provided, of course, that the authorities were completely satisfied that we were not about to introduce equine influenza into New Zealand.

The Crown Law opinion made it absolutely clear that the process of developing the amended import health standard could not be progressed further unless we managed to change this legislation. That is a very practical example of the need for urgency around the legislation.

The select committee received a number of submissions from members of the equine industry who said they actually do not understand the issue around the import health standard with regard to the importation of honey, or the import health standard situation around the importing of pork. But they desperately needed the recommencement of this equine trade between the two countries, which is worth many hundreds of millions of dollars. They were a group of submitters who made a very strong case to the select committee for urgency on the issue to be required.

I speak completely in support of the title, clause 1, and of an urgent commencement date, clause 2, with regard to this legislation.

Aleikum salaam. I take this brief call. As has been said earlier, this bill was necessary. The Primary Production Committee had to rather hurriedly consider the bill; although I would not like to call the consideration urgent, it was hurried.

Clearly, there was an issue for the industry in terms of trade. As has been said by the previous speaker, there was an issue about the trade of horses between New Zealand and Australia. So this bill was necessary.

The select committee was sort of blamed by some submitters for the hurried consideration of the bill. Clearly, this bill was required because of the court case. The Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry had received advice from Crown Law that this bill was necessary. The bill was referred to the select committee and we did a great job in having additional sittings to get the bill through. We heard 15 submitters and we came up with some amendments. Hopefully the bee-keepers are happy with the amendments. It was important that the bill be done in that time frame.

We had advice from the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade, as well, to make sure that our overseas trade did not suffer as a result of this bill. With that, I commend this bill.

Tēnā koe, Mr Chairperson. I want to refer to two issues. The National member talked about the importation of horses, which I will refer to, and I will also refer briefly to the Department of Conservation and its involvement in the Biosecurity and Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Legislation Amendment Bill.

First of all, I reiterate the Green Party’s concern, which is evidenced in the papers prepared by the ministry in 2006, that the original intent of this legislation was to allow for the importation, or the bringing into New Zealand, of genetically modified organisms. It is very good to have heard the National Party refer to the issue of importing horses, because the equine flu vaccination is a genetically modified vaccination. It is a living genetically modified virus, and there is no permission to enable it to be introduced into our country. That would be the responsibility of the Environmental Risk Management Authority. If someone wanted to bring that vaccine into New Zealand, that person would have to go through the Environmental Risk Management Authority process. If someone wanted to do that, it would be the first living genetically modified organism released at large into New Zealand and our environment.

That raises very serious concerns. The New Zealand public do not want to see these organisms released into our environment. It is quite right that the Environmental Risk Management Authority would be the organisation that would assess it. But under this bill, if a horse were imported into the country and that horse had been vaccinated with this living genetically modified virus vaccine, then it would be an unintentional importation of an organism and would come under the definition in this legislation. It would be perfectly legal for the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry to allow for the importation of that genetically modified, known but incidental, passenger organism into this country.

Where would the risk assessment sit? Well, it would sit with the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry and with the biosecurity agencies. What criteria do those organisations use to assess these kinds of organisms? Well, they do not have a precautionary principle. They do not have the rigorous scientific process that the Environmental Risk Management Authority has, which is set out in the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act. They would be able to assess it according to their own criteria, which are at a much lower level and are much more risk-happy assessment criteria. We could have the first living genetically modified organism at large in our country as a result of this legislation.

One wonders what the National Party’s interest is in supporting this bill. It concerns me greatly. I wonder whether it is because National is quite interested in the racing industry. One might want to reflect back to 2005, when there was a very good relationship between the National Party and the racing industry at that time. Some of that relationship was exposed later, after the election. So is this interest part of that relationship? Is that why the National Party is quite OK with legislation that will allow, in law, potentially, for this organism to come into the country as a passenger organism?

It is a very worrying issue, and I think the New Zealand public have the right to have some concerns about it. I know the Minister is likely to stand up and say that the bill excludes genetically modified organisms. What he will not tell the public is that in 2006 the papers that were prepared around this issue specifically allowed for this legislation to include and allow for the importation of GMOs, and that that was the policy position of this Labour Government in 2006.

What has changed? Well, it is election year—that has changed. We all know that New Zealanders will not accept the introduction of GMOs into our country, because we know the risks that those organisms will have to our biodiversity, to our threatened species, and to our primary production sector, which is, as the Minister is so pleased to repeat, such a major part of our economy. Yet the two old parties in this House are prepared to risk that major part of our economy. The Minister himself is prepared to do that for this legislation.

I always like to think that members of this House, by the time they get here, would be inclined to let the facts get in the way of their prejudices. The facts are that New Zealand’s biosecurity system already, on a daily basis, allows animals—horses, dogs, cats; animals of a whole variety—

💬 Shane Ardern: Human beings.

—human beings, actually—to be vaccinated. If the tests show after quarantine periods that the vaccine is no longer alive, then those animals are allowed into New Zealand. If we did not do that, we would be erecting a non-tariff, non-scientific barrier to trade, and immediately we—this country of 4 million in the South Pacific—would be standing against the 6,000 million to 7,000 million people everywhere else that we want to trade with. And guess who would erect non-tariff barriers against us? They all would, immediately. Why? Because 65 percent of our entire exchange earnings are earned from the primary sector of New Zealand, and every country in the world fears us because we are so efficient and so productive in those areas. If any members in this Chamber want to know what would happen if that occurred, they just have to look at the situation in some Second and Third World countries, because that is what would happen to us, at a rate of knots.

One cannot have the most important base of one’s whole economy put at risk by the mumbo-jumbo jingoistic slogans we have heard today—that is what they are. The science of the situation tells us there is a problem here that we need to solve by law. We are solving it in a proper way, and what we get is conspiracy theories about the Court of Appeal and the officials in Biosecurity New Zealand. According to the conspiracy theories, members from both major parties in the House, aided and abetted by me—I have actually been in Opposition with most of them all my life, as a matter of fact—have somehow got together to conspire. Well, it is nonsense.

Let me say this. We have a situation right now where our biosecurity system, which is at the core of our agricultural base, is actually paralysed. We cannot move anything in here; we cannot even guarantee that the import health standards that allow people to bring stuff in now could not be challenged in court today, tomorrow, or the next day and eliminated. If that started to happen, our international reputation as a science-based biosecurity economy would go right out the window.

That may not be of any moment to people who have never yet been in Government, but I can tell members that it is different once the responsibility of being in Government is on a member, and when that member has to make the calls that will strike at the livelihood of hundreds of thousands of New Zealanders overnight. That might not worry the Green Party, but it worries the heck out of me, and I know it worries the heck out of a lot of other members in this Chamber.

I am pleased to see that members of the Primary Production Committee—led by the Hon David Carter—who have spoken in the Chamber today, and the overwhelming majority of members of this Committee, are seized with that urgency. I applaud those members for that, and I look forward to this bill having the most urgent passage that is possible.

Tēnā koe. Well, there we have it. The Minister Jim Anderton has exposed the primary reason for the Government’s support for the Biosecurity and Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Legislation Amendment Bill, and why it has been brought forward, which is that it is to do with trade relationships with other countries. What he is really saying here is that New Zealand has signed up to international trade agreements, which means that we are not able to exercise the level of border control that the New Zealand public believes is crucial to protecting our country from incursions of other organisms from overseas that may put our economy and our environment at risk.

What he said in this last little speech of his was that trade barriers are a major concern for him. Therefore, he will propose legislation that will open up our borders to known organisms that could pose a serious threat to our environment and to our economy.

Mr Anderton talks about the value of these trade processes to the country, but he is not reminding the Committee or the public at this time that one of the main threats of these kinds of organisms is to our primary sector—to our farming sector, our horticultural sector, our forestry sector, and potentially even our fishing sector and aquacultural sector. Those are industries on which our country relies, and we are obligated to protect them to the maximum extent possible. We rely on those industries to a very large extent for the economic well-being of this country.

That has always been the Green Party’s position. That is why we have always opposed the introduction of GMOs into this country. That is why the Greens have strongly promoted environmental measures to protect our environment, so that the land on which our primary sector is based, and the water on which our primary sector is based, is healthy and clean and can continue to support those sectors well into the future, for my grandchildren and great-grandchildren and for all of our grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

At the same time as we are trying to protect our economy and our environment from these incursions, the Labour Government, along with the National Party, is supporting legislation that gives control and decision making over known organisms that could cause serious risk to our country to an organisation, a ministry, that has a very low risk-assessment process.

The Labour Government, along with the National Party, has diverted the law. The Government has an alternative. It does not have to give this power to biosecurity agencies; it could give this power to the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act and the Environmental Risk Management Authority, which is designed to deal with these issues. The authority has a precautionary principle and the scientific, rigorous processes in place to deal with known passenger organisms.

But, no, it has chosen not to take the most rigorous approach. It has chosen not to provide the maximum level of protection to our environment and to our economy. Instead, it has given the power to biosecurity agencies, which have a much lower risk-assessment threshold.

We know, for example, that environmental organisations that are part of the Government have said that this bill will not protect our environment. In January of last year the Department of Conservation said that it did not support the proposal. The department said that the legislation would reduce the quality of risk assessment, would expose New Zealand to greater risk from new organisms, would create an inconsistent system, and is an unwarranted relative to the problem the Government was trying to solve.

One of our principal organisations for the protection of our environment, for the protection of our biodiversity, and for the protection of our threatened native species has said that this bill will pose a risk to that environment and to those species. The Department of Conservation did not support this legislation. It did not make a submission, and we might like to ask why. Is it that the Department of Conservation was not allowed to? Why did it not make a submission on this legislation?

We know that there is not support from the Government’s own environmental agencies that are responsible for protecting our environment from these kinds of incursions. We know that the Government in 2006 intended for this legislation to allow for GMOs to be introduced. And we know that there is some kind of connection between National and the racing industry, so perhaps that is why National is supporting this legislation.

I was not going to take another call, but the member has accused those who are supporting this bill of misleading the public. She says that the Department of Conservation made submissions that opposed the bill, and asks whether we would like to explain why. I tell the Committee that the member and the Green Party were supplied with the following email, which I will read out. I suggest to Ms Turei that when a member gets up in this Chamber, that member should at least balance what he or she says with some facts. Here is the email that the Green Party was supplied with, from the Department of Conservation: “Notwithstanding the assertion in the article”—the article on the Stuff website—“that ‘the Department of Conservation had been cut out of the consultation at Cabinet level’, the Department of Conservation is in fact satisfied that it was consulted on this matter in 2006-07, and more recently on the draft bill and Cabinet papers. Our early view in 2006 was that there was insufficient justification, given the information to hand, to warrant the proposed changes. That context changed with the National Beekeepers’ Association court case. DOC acknowledged the legal advice MAF had received on the risk MAF faced, and that Cabinet has agreed to the need for legislative change. DOC was consulted on the draft bill, proposed some changes that were accepted, and is satisfied that the draft bill intends to address the immediate legal issues faced by MAF.”

If the member has had that email—and I know the Green Party has—I ask why on earth she has not acknowledged it here instead of going on in the tirade way she did. I do not think that is a particularly honest way of debating. If the member knows the content of the email, she should have acknowledged it here. This is the truth: the Department of Conservation has been consulted and has acceded to this bill because the department knows that the legislation is necessary because of the court case. That should at least be acknowledged as being the facts of the matter by Ms Turei.

Mr Anderton did not finish reading that email. I have a copy of the email here with me, and there is a final paragraph that I am sure is available to him; I know I have it. It states: “DOC also expressed the view in 2006”—that long ago—“that the Biosecurity Act should have minimum standards, and that the precautionary principle be applied within it, as does the HASNO Act. The Biosecurity Act currently lacks the transparency and certainty that the principles and such criteria provided in HASNO, and this poses risks. DOC still holds this view”—I have this email from 11 March—“and wishes to see this issue addressed in the future.” That is what the Minister failed to read out in the Chamber just now.

Why did he do that? It may well be that the Department of Conservation agrees that it was consulted. It is clear that the department was obviously asked the question about the legislation. The department says that, and we have information about it. But the department did not make a submission on the legislation, and it reiterated that it retains concerns that the Biosecurity Act does not have the provisions or principles in place to provide adequate protection of our environment.

It is all fine and well for Mr Anderton to make comments about consultation, but he is not telling the public the fact that it is our environment and our economy that are being put at risk, and that the Government department responsible for the protection of our environment, in particular, has said that a risk is posed, and that that risk has not been addressed in this legislation. So I am asking the very serious question here about how much risk we are prepared to put our environment at, for the purpose of preventing the trade agreement problems this Government has because it was part of signing a trade agreement that prevented us from having controls that would protect our environment.

If the Government signs agreements that stop us from putting in place those protections, then that is its responsibility. It is not a conspiracy; it is just the truth. It is the Government’s responsibility, and the Government has failed the country. Now it is imposing on the country legislation that has been put through the House in a very speedy way, that denies a proper public and transparent process—because there was not time for people to read and understand the legislation and to make proper submissions on it—and that does not even have one of the Government’s own key departments involved in this bill by making a submission so that we can see the bill’s full impacts on our natural environment.

There is no excuse here. Mr Anderton, the Government, and the National Party, which is supporting the legislation, have no excuse for the risk they are putting our environment at. I reiterate that this is not just about the environment; this is about our economy, because our economy is dependent on our environment. We all know that. That is why the community works so hard to clean up our waterways, and why we work so hard with farming communities and urban communities to clean up their environment. We know how dependent we are on it.

Yet at the same time that the community is doing this work and prioritising a clean environment that we can rely on, the Government, with its friends the National Party, is putting legislation through a hurried process that lacks public transparency and puts the very environment and economy at risk.

There is no excuse for that. No amount of talking about trade issues or trying to accuse the Greens of conspiracies will change the fact that this legislation puts our environment and our economy at risk, and the Labour Government and the National Party are supporting that risk.

The Greens have supported the changes to this bill that we think will make it better, because that is a responsible thing to do. We will be opposing this legislation because of the risk it poses to our environment and our economy and because it prevents New Zealanders from truly having a say on the real issues here. Thank you, Mr Chair.

I will take just a brief call to support the title and commencement date as proposed in the Biosecurity and Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Legislation Amendment Bill. Yes, our economy is dependent on our environment. It is also dependent on trade, on the ability of organisms and livestock to move between countries, and on our ability to be able to import and export.

It is for that reason that I stand to support the commencement date, particularly, and also to applaud the Primary Production Committee on the very quick and thorough work it has done in looking at this bill so that it can proceed and so that this legislation can be put in place quickly.

I was present when the Proprietors of Taharoa C Block, a Māori corporation, talked with the Prime Minister about the importance of being able to import the particular plant it needed to go into a very important and successful biofuels venture it is working on. I have listened carefully to what the previous speaker, Metiria Turei from the Green Party, has argued. I really do not believe that people who have worked with the environment for many, many decades—people who have at their basis the understanding of the importance of our land and the spirituality of that land, being the people who are concerned with this particular Māori corporation—would ask the Prime Minister to see to the speedy resolution of this issue if they believed that our environment would be at risk as a result.

So I can stand up and happily support the commencement date of this bill. We need this legislation to be put in place quickly. That was reinforced by people in the Waikato area and beyond, in relation to the importance of some of the issues they are working on. I support what previous speakers have said about the importance to the equine industry—in particular, the horse breeding industry—of not having things frozen unnecessarily while we address the unforeseen consequences of a court case that I do not think anyone in this country saw coming.

We had this situation before us. We have acted promptly. I believe that that is what New Zealanders would want to occur, because we are a country that is reliant on the freedom of movement in that way. We needed to deal with this matter urgently and we have done so. I congratulate the Minister and also the members of the select committee on dealing with it in a quick and thorough way.